Yet, in late October a collection of Laaksonen’s poems, Ko lehm kikatta, was translated into Latvian – the dialects of Ainaži and Salacgrīva – by Guntars Godinsh, underlining a resilient interest in dialects. Indeed, twenty years after the dialect boom in Finland, amidst intensifying globalisation and multilingualism, dialects are embraced as markers of affinity and local identity – sentiments encapsulated by the passage above, crudely rendered into English below.

“I like to be surrounded by my own language, be in small circles, where I know the people and the people know me.”

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Aleksi TeivainenHelsinki TimesLEHTIKUVA / TIMO JAAKONAHO

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